The Penal Coroner
by QuinnDeRavensborough
Summary: On their trip to visit Aunt Josephine, Anne and her friends end up going to Quebec. And encountering trouble. That's pretty much it. Will they survive whatever dangers they face? Will they make sense of their constantly changing surroundings? Will Gilbert confess his undying love for Anne?
1. Chapter 1

It was a bright, spring day, with the robins singing and the crows cawing elegantly, and flowers blanketed the fields like candy crushed under an unhygienic automobile tire. Everything was going perfectly that day, and Anne sat gleefully looking out the train window on her way to Charlottetown.

"Oh, it's always just so absolutely beautiful taking the train the Charlottetown!" Anne said. "Every time I go, I get this felicitous rush of happiness!"

"So do I!" Diana said, agreeing in fewer words.

They both gazed out the window dreamily.

Suddenly, Anne exclaimed, "Look, Gilbert! Sheep! They must be ever so far away from home…"

Gilbert was accompanying them, partly to put Marilla and Mrs. Barry's minds at ease, but mostly because he had an intense, secret crush on Anne and wanted to spend some time with her. She wasn't completely aware of his extreme affection for her, though she did sense that he started hyperventilating whenever she told him he had dirt on his jacket.

They all stared out at the window. It appeared like all the sheep on Prince Edward Island were having some sort of convention. They were hanging out in little groups, and selling each other goodies made out of grass and dandelions. There was even some sort of stage set up, where a ewe was performing a concert of baas.

"That's weird," Diana said.

"I think it's beautiful," Anne said.

The train ride was fairly uneventful. The girls dared each other to eat a raw egg, but wouldn't take the dare themselves. Cool, right? Anyways, they arrived in Charlottetown around noon, and the sun beat down on their heads, but felt better compared to that stuffy train, so they didn't care. Aunt Josephine's chauffeur Lenny picked them up, and that was that.

When they arrived at Aunt Josephine's house, there was a delicious dinner set up for them. There was ocean pie with Waldorf salad and mashed beets, as well as couscous on a muffin. For dessert, there was an option of mashed Swede with brown sugar, or chocolate chocolate chip zucchini cake. Everyone chose the latter.

"Aunt Josephine," Anne said, "where's Cole?"

"Oh, he'll be here soon," Aunt Josephine said. "He's buying our tickets."

"Tickets?" Diana asked.

"Like, to the opera?" Anne asked. "Oh, how romantical! I've never been to the opera before, and always wanted to go!"

Gilbert chuckled to himself- he loved how Anne's mannerisms and ways of talking made his heart feel light like a dodo feather.

"No, not to the opera," Aunt Josephine said. "It's… um… hard to explain. I need the help of all you children, and it requires getting back on that train."

"Where are we going, Aunt Josephine?" Diana asked.

"Somewhere slightly far…"

"To another city?"

"No, to Quebec."

Everyone stared at Aunt Josephine, stunned.

"Well, there are cities in Quebec," Anne said, smiling gleefully, "so, technically Diana might still be right."

"Cities are repulsive means to create environmental damage," Aunt Josephine said. "No, we're going to a village called Grenouille. It's relatively small, but that is where I must get my work done."

There was more silence around the table.

"Do my parents know about this?" Diana asked.

"I may have told them you would be gone longer than they expected…" Aunt Josephine muttered.

Diana stared at her.

"All right, you found me out!" Aunt Josephine exclaimed. "I only implied, I didn't tell them outright!"

"I've always wanted to go to Quebec," Anne said. "Next to Saskatchewan, and the Lake of Shining Waters, it sounds like one of the most romantical places in the world."

Gilbert said, "What sort of work are you needing done, Miss Barry?"

"Oh, sugar pie, you can call me Aunt Josephine like the other children!" Aunt Josephine said. "But, to answer your question, I cannot tell you the nature of my work, only that it involves a great deal of stuff it can involve a great deal of."

Needless to say, everyone was a little confused.

"Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned," Jerry said. "It's been two months since my last confession."

"What is this sin, my child?" Father O'MacBergmann said from behind the screen. He eyed Jerry suspiciously, not approving of his long hair and his French nose.

Jerry started crying. He couldn't control his guilt, but also couldn't control his shame. He knew the priests at Saint Christopher the Wonderworker of Lyon-and-Assissi's Church in Charlottetown would gossip about what the parishioners would confess, but this was the only Catholic church Jerry's family could get two on a semi-semi-regular basis, so he had to deal with this kind of humiliation, albeit a minor humiliation.

"Father, you must promise not to tell anyone," Jerry said.

"I would never." Father O'MacBergmann giggled mischievously.

Jerry confessed, "I've fallen in love with a Protestant girl."

Father O'MacBergmann was silent for a moment, then said, "Is there more?"

"No," Jerry said.

"Wow… If there'd been more, this would have been the gossip of the year. Is this innocent crush all that's occurred so far? Has there been any kissing, or handholding?"

"There's been flirting."

"Ooh! What did you say?"

"I don't remember. I think I said something along the lines of, 'T'es la plus belle femme que j'ai vue dans tous le monde, ma chérie, oh ho ho!'"

Father O'MacBergmann thought a moment. This boy looked familiar.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Jerry."

The same name as the son of the church's most generous tither, William LeBoeuf-O'Flaigherty. If a man like him had a son with a crush on a Protestant girl, oh, the scandal it would cause!

"And, your last name?" the mischievous priest asked.

"Baynard," Jerry replied.

"F*ck," the priest cursed. "I was hoping you were… Nevermind. Say the Act of Contrition once, the Our Father give times, and fifty or so Hail Marys."

"How come we say Hail Marys more than Our Fathers?" Jerry asked. "Shouldn't it be the other way around?"

"And go visit a dialect coach," Father O'MacBergmann said. "It's obvious that you're foreign!"

"I was born and raised here," Jerry said. "And so were my parents. Actually, this used to be a place called Acadia, before…"

"Yeah, I don't care. Scat!"

Jerry left the confessional, bumping into Father LeChat.

"Où étiez vous?!" he exclaimed. "Ce prêtre anglais est horrible!"

Father LeChat smiled sadly, and, patting Jerry on the head, said, "Oh, coucou Jerry, passer le temps avec Père O'MacBergmann est parti de la punition pour tes péchés."

After penance, Jerry left the church. He had plenty of errands to run, and was very unpleased that he hadn't been able to come to Charlottetown early.

"J'ai trop de choses pour faire aujourd'hui," he muttered. "Ah, ben. J'ai de temps pour déjeuner maintenant, mais qu'est-ce que Marilla m'a dit qu'elle voudrait? Comment peux-je oublier?!"

He was about to have a stress attack when he noticed three familiar faces.

"Anne!" he hollered, rushing down the church steps towards her.

"Jerry!" Anne smiled, reaching out to hug him.

Gilbert and Diana both felt pangs of jealousy (though, if you ask me, they're the ones who should get together [lol jk ; they're too chill to actually get any housework done together, so a marriage between them would be detrimental]).

"What are you doing in town?" Jerry asked.

"Diana and I wanted to pay a visit to Aunt Josephine," Anne said, "and we somehow got roped into an adventure!"

"Adventure?" Jerry asked. The last two times he'd been on an adventure, he'd ended up being beat up by those two lily-livered, yellow-toothed ragamuffins. "Anne, you should be careful."

"It's not going to be all that bad," Anne said. "We're going to Quebec."

Jerry's eyes opened wide. He'd always wanted to go to Quebec, ever since he learned about poutine. (He was very hungry at the moment, and so he associated Quebec with food).

"Can I please go with you?" he asked.

"But what about your family?" Gilbert asked, unhappy at the prospect of Jerry tagging along. "Don't they need your help, because they're…" He didn't want to say "poor", but he'd already implied that, and started to feel a bit bad about being so rude. But, he still tried to look resolute.

"Oh, it shouldn't be a problem!" Jerry said. "My lazy, good-for-nothing older brother Jean-Charles can just help out."

"But what about Marilla and Matthew?" Anne asked.

"Uh…" Jerry thought a moment. "They'll just have to do what they did before either of us came. They're strong and resolute."

"Oh, how heartless," Diana exclaimed, "and manly!"

"I know," Jerry said, winking at her. "I try."

"Well, let's be off to the train station, then," Anne said.

When they arrived at the train station, Aunt Josephine and Cole were already there, waiting for them.

"Aunt Josephine," Anne requested, "will it suffice if Jerry accompanies us?"

Aunt Josephine eyed Jerry suspiciously at first, but then she smiled and said, "Of course. Many hands make light work, as Mr. Bentley used to say."

"Who's Mr. Bentley?" Gilbert whispered to Anne.

"I don't know," Anne whispered back. "Aunt Josephine has ever so many friends."

"Something which secrets don't make," Aunt Josephine interrupted. "Now, off we go. Grenouille, here we come!"

Once they were all settled on the train, Anne said, "Jerry, this here is my friend, Cole. He's a sculptor."

"Really?" Jerry asked. "So, Cole, if you can sculpt things, could you please make some better statues for my church? _The Severed Head of John the Baptist on a Plate_ just lacks some realism, and it's distracting the congregants."

"I can try to make a replacement," Cole said, "but I mostly just work with clay, now, and don't have the skills or the money to coat it in fake marble or melted copper."

The train started. Soon, they were on their way to their mysterious destination. Getting the train off Prince Edward Island proved to be dangerous, but all it had to do was drive over several unsuspecting ferries, and, once it was back on dry land, there was nothing to worry about.

"Oh, isn't the countryside so absolutely beautiful!" Anne said. "We shall call this place the Land of High Grass!"

"I think it's called New Brunswick," Gilbert said. "I wouldn't know, though, considering that medical knowledge is draining the rest of knowledge, including geography, out of my brain."

The children had no way of knowing how long it was before they arrived at the train station in Montreal. It felt like days, but they were refreshed afterwards as if it'd only been a few hours. Train rides through the countryside tend to have that affect on people.

Once at the station, they were met by a mysterious man in a carriage.

"Bonjour, Madame Barry," he said. "Monsieur Beurre is awaiting you."

"Good day, Morveux," Aunt Josephine said, getting into the carriage, followed by the children. "I see you're as healthy as ever."

"That's because I drink a glass of dirt-water every night," Morveux said. "I bet your chauffeur Lenny can't drive a carriage as effectively as I can."

"Well, he prefers regular water, so he gets no cerebral mineral help," Aunt Josephine said, situating herself into her seat.

The carriage drove on for a long time. It drove out of the city, and through some more countryside. It was dark outside by the time it reached Grenouille. They arrived at a two-story house with broken window shutters and some sort of plant hanging down from the roof.

Aunt Josephine and the children got out of the carriage and, following Morveux, went into the house. Standing in the middle of the parlor was a man in a bright pink smoking jacket and green pants.

"Good day, Josephine," he said. "It's been a while, soul sister."

"Children," Aunt Josephine said, "this here is my good friend, Monsieur Aaron Beurre. Aaron, this little dark-haired girl is my grandniece, Diana."

"Enchantée, monsieur," Diana said, curtseying.

Monsieur Beurre laughed loudly.

"No need to curtsy, my dear," he said. "I'm only considered high-class in this village because I wear this awesome jacket. Anyways, what are the names of the other children?"

The children introduced themselves.

Monsieur Beurre said to Anne, "You appear to be the leader of your friend group."

"We don't have a leader," Anne said. "We're friends."

"But you have the prophetic voice that inspires them," he said. "You seem like you're ahead by a century."

Anne didn't quite know how to take this complement. She just smiled, speechless for the first time in her life.

Everything else that night was small talk, dinner, more small talk, then everyone went to bed. Anne and Diana didn't mind sharing a bed, but the boys had a bit of a struggle, because throughout the night, one would roll over, causing another to fall flat on their face on the floor.

The next morning, at breakfast, the girls were smiling and happy, while the boys had panda eyes. Monsieur Beurre had prepared for everyone a large pot of oatmeal, served with raisins and butter, with toast on the side. Aunt Josephine said Grace, then everyone started eating.

"You should put some butter on your toast before dipping it in the oatmeal," Monsieur Beurre said to Gilbert.

"But there's already enough butter in the oatmeal," Gilbert said. "That's enough flavor for me, and…"

"But you're so skinny, as well! No, slather some butter on your toast, or you'll wither away."

"But butter is full of saturated fat. Also, I feel perfectly fine."

"Pish-poo! I put butter on everything! Just last night, I mixed butter in with my tobacco. It clogs my pipe, but the fumes are worth it."

Cole said, "You really should eat better, Gilbert. Anne told me in her last letter that you're only eating twice a day, breakfast being the meal you normally skip."

"Anne, you talk about me with your friends?" Gilbert asked.

Anne blushed a deep red, which made Gilbert blush a deep red. They started slurping at their oatmeal nervously.

"I normally just eat a biscuit or jam tartine for breakfast," Monsieur Beurre said, "but after seeing the sorry state of this boy, I decided it was best to encourage the splurge."

"If you want to maintain health, but have to skip a meal," Aunt Josephine said to Gilbert, "skip dinner. It's no use consuming so much energy right before bedtime."

"I always eat dinner," Cole said. "Am I eating too much?"

"You're a growing boy," Aunt Josephine said, spooning some more oatmeal into his bowl.

After eating, they followed Monsieur Beurre into the parlor.

"Now, children," Monsieur Beurre said, "the reason my good friend Josephine brought you all here to Grenouille is for a very important purpose. An evil has befallen Quebec, and my trusty sources say it is residing here in this very village. It entered over twenty years ago, when the Canadians took over la Belle Province, and has been wreaking havoc here since then. You children, and your Aunt Josephine, must put a stop to it."

"Oh, how dreadful!" Diana gasped. "What sort of evil is this?"

"One of the worst types of evils out there," Monsieur Beurre said. "Sadly, my trusty sources are unable to specify exactly what type of evil this is. It's mostly a McGuffin of sorts."

"Oh, I love McGuffins!" Jerry told Anne. "When's Marilla going to make more blueberry McGuffins?"

"Jerry, do you even know what a McGuffin is?" Cole asked.

"It's like a cupcake, right?" Jerry replied. "Except… it doesn't have that creamy frosting stuff on top, and is much more substantial."

Cole rolled his eyes. Jerry annoyed him, for some reason, and he really wished that the sweet farmhand hadn't come on this adventure.

"Now, be off, my pretties!" Monsieur Beurre shouted. "And don't come back till lunchtime!"

Everyone went outside, feeling confused. Except Aunt Josephine.

"The evil is probably in the woods just outside of town," she said. "Follow me, children."

As they walked out of the village, Anne got a feeling that something was right. Once the small party reached the woods, she truly felt uncomfortable. Each of the trees seemed to be laughing, and she felt as if a thousand eyes were staring at her.

She felt Diana clutch her arm.

"Anne," she said, "I've got the most disgusting feeling."

"I know," Anne replied. "Me too."

They both looked about them, observing the trees, which were gnarled and twisted, reaching high above their heads. That's when they noticed that the other members of their party were gone.

"Oh, Anne! What do we do?"

"I don't know… I feel entirely unsure."

There was nothing inherently terrifying about these woods. Anne couldn't shake off the feeling of being abandoned to someone else's devices, though. Maybe she was just freaking out- last winter, Billy had destroyed her own sanctuary in the woods back in Avonlea.

"We should just find Aunt Josephine and the others," Anne said.

Diana tried to smile, nodding her head for effect.

They turned around, and walked back in the direction they came from. They kept finding themselves among thick growth, though, and were unable to leave the woods.

"We should turn around," Anne said.

"I thought we already did that," Diana said.

"No, we were trying to leave the woods."

"Yes, and then we turned around to… Oh, no! We're lost!"

The two girls took a good look around them, decided upon a direction, and started walking again. It's not like if they waited anyone they knew would find them, not in this confusing tree labyrinth.

"Where did everyone else go?" Jerry asked.

"I have no clue," Cole replied, irritated that they could get lost at all.

They were both silent for a moment, staring at the woods surrounding them.

"Which direction should we go in?" Cole asked, running a hand through his hair.

"We should stay where we are," Jerry said. "We want our friends to find us, and if we run around looking for them, it will make things too inconvenient for them."

Cole stared at Jerry, then said, "Actually, that makes a lot of sense."

The two of them sat down and waited. They weren't quite sure how long they waited, but it felt like an hour. They were silent the whole time.

Until Jerry couldn't handle it anymore.

"I'm bored," he said.

Cole, who was using a stick to make drawings in the dirt, said, "Then count your toes."

"I already did," Jerry said. "My pinky toe on my right foot looks really weird, and so I got distracted, and almost forgot that I had ten."

"How could you…? Oh, never mind."

There was more awkward silence between them.

"So, how do you know Anne?" Jerry asked.

"We were classmates," Cole said.

"Oh, so you go to school together?"

"We _were_ classmates. Then I stopped going to school."

"How could you stop going to school? School is such a privilege."

"I was being bullied."

"Oh."

More awkward silence.

Just then, they heard the sound of singing in the distance. Before they knew it, they saw a man walking in their direction. His voice was clear like the autumn breeze, as lively as the spring and summer breezes, and as congested as the breeze all-year-round next to a grass seed farm. He was singing a song that was kind of like "Le P'tit Bonheur", but had more references to cannibalism in it.

"Bon matin, garçons," the man said. "Qu'est-ce qui se passe ici? Vous avez les visages des petits chats perdus sans leure mère."

"Monsieur, vous êtes trop sympathique," Jerry said, standing up. Cole stood up, looking a little scared. "On est vraiment perdu. Pouvez-vous nous aider?"

"D'accord," the man said, smiling, showing off a row of teeth that were a little too white. "Venez avec moi."

Jerry was about to follow the man, but Cole grabbed his arm and said, "I don't trust that man."

"What do you mean?" Jerry asked.

"There something… wrong about him," Cole said.

"If you don't trust me," the man said, "then stay where you are. Stay lost."

"I think he speaks English," Cole said to Jerry.

"Of course I speak English," the man said. "Now, may I ask your names?"

"I'm Snarty Snarkfaller," Cole said, "and this is… Harry LeBonjour? Yeah, that's his name. No lie there."

"You boys are hiding something," the man said, crossing his arms and pointing at them.

Both boys were silent.

"I knew it," the man said. "You're both being so awkward. Two boys out in the woods can only mean one thing. You two are obviously nixes."

"What?" Jerry's jaw dropped slightly with confusion.

"Sure, we are," Cole said. "Every mature mind would come to that conclusion."

"I could easily tell by your green teeth," the man said, staring at Cole's mouth.

Cole covered his mouth.

"That's just leafy vegetable matter," he said. "Aunt Josephine is a woke vegetarian, so I eat a lot of lettuce, spinach, kale, celery, broccoli… Not all of those are particularly leafy, but that doesn't mean I'm lying about not being a nix."

"Hm." The man scratched his ear, then said, "Well, you two had better follow me."

Both boys thought they might as well follow this strange guy. He already knew where they were, so if he harbored any ill will, he could totally have kidnapped them, killed them, then sold their pelts on Fourth Street. Couldn't get much worse than that. Probably.

"This is bad," Gilbert said. "Aunt Josephine, what are we going to do?"

They'd had the most unfruitful time trying to find their friends lost in the woods, and had returned into town to talk over the issue with Monsieur Beurre. Inconveniently, Monsieur Beurre was at work (though no one in their right mind would hire him for anything; he worked with taxes).

"We should do what I always do when someone I care about is lost," Aunt Josephine said.

For what feels like the umpteenth time in this story, there was an awkward silence.

"And, that is…?" Gilbert was trying to be polite, but it was getting difficult. He really cared for Anne, and sort of cared for all those other people lost in that wooded area, so he was getting kind of cranky.

"First, we drink tea," Aunt Josephine said, "then we use the tea leaves to determine where everyone is. The boys got lost first, and the girls got lost next, which implies that there are two missing parties from our one party. So, we need to use the leaves from two teacups to determine separately their whereabouts. You're a boy, so you'll be able to use your leaves to find the boys."

"How does that even work?"

"Well, the tea notices you have boy spit, so it'll just assume you care more about finding other boys."

"But Anne's the person I'm in love with!"

"You want the tea to confuse your spit with Anne's? That'd mean you're related."

"Wow, these tea leaves are really confused. Do they just assume all people of the same gender are related?"

"Not Gertrude and me. That's how I knew we would be right for each other. Tea never fails, as long as it isn't one of those fake herbal infusions."

They drank their tea in relative silence (Gilbert tried not to slurp and gulp, but it was just too difficult). Eventually, they were able to look at their tea leaves.

Aunt Josephine looked in her cup first.

"It looks like the girls are lost in the North-Southern section of the woods," she said. "Gilbert, show me your cup."

"I think I burned my tongue," the sad boy complained.

Aunt Josephine looked at Gilbert's cup, then said, "It looks like the boys are in the company of a Celtic man."

"Really?" Gilbert asked. "Is his skin painted blue?"

"That's a rotten stereotype," Aunt Josephine said. "But his name is Angus Rotty McSnottery, so I guess some stereotypes are true."

"That's a terrible name."

"I know. He appears to me a turf accountant."

"Can we get back to talking about Anne's predicament?"

"She and Diana are about to walk into a cave occupied by hornets, and some endangered bats."

"Well, if they're hanging out with a bunch of hornets, I can see why the bats are an endangered species."

"We must rescue the girls, the boys, and maybe the bats if they're in the middle of being attacked by those hornets. I like bats. I remember when I was a babybat- it was after hearing Siouxsie Sioux's dramatic reading of 'Carmilla'. I could only dress the part on holidays, though, since my boss wanted me to look 'presentable'."

It was hard to believe Aunt Josephine would be so compliant to the system, but this was no time for Gilbert to inquire into her past. Right now, they had to find Anne, and the other friends, before it was too late.

Anne and Diana were staring at the cave.

"Should we go in?" Anne asked.

"Why would we ever just go into a cave?" Diana asked. "We don't want to get even more lost."

"But I just thought of the most tragical tale about this gave- it's the home of a lost explorer, like us, who has to depend on his own understanding of nature for survival."

"Oh, Anne, you have such a wonderful imagination, but, right now, I can only think of this as a cave."

"I know. That's because you're on a lower plane of existence, a zoophyte, so to speak."

"What's a zoophyte?"

"I don't know. I read it in a book on Darwin's travels on the _Beagle_. It was totally and utterly trippy, and filled my head with such romantical ideas."

"About species' extinctions? Well, suit yourself, Anne. Anyways, I don't think we should go into the cave."

"But it might get dark soon."

"I thought it was still morning."

"No, it's afternoon."

The two girls tried to see what direction of the sky the sun was in, but the trees covered it up, so it was impossible to tell.

"This trip's crap," Diana said. "This is the last time I'm going anywhere on a whim with anyone."

Just then, they saw a wolf peek at them from behind a tree. She was wearing woolen knickers and a woolen jumper, and wore a straw hat on her head. She smiled at the girls.

"Bonjour, petites filles," she said. "Voulez-vous explorer la caverne? Vous devez, parce qu'il y a beaucoup de choses magnifiques dans ce type d'endroit."

"We're not going into that stupid cave!" Diana said. "Now, get away, wolf!"

"Diana, be nice to the wolf!" Anne said. "She just wants to give us directions… I think. I've been trying to learn French, but as of yet I only know how to say 'oui', 'baguette', and 'Parlez-vous franglais'."

"That wolf wants us to go into the cave," Diana said.

"Well, I guess we can trust her, then, since she lives here," Anne said. "What does she have to gain from us going into the cave and getting hurt?"

"Maybe her family lives in there."

"That cave is too big for an entire wolf pack to live in. Plus, I thought wolves were nomadic."

The wolf rolled her eyes, walked right up to the girls, and pushed them into the cave.

The two girls found themselves in total darkness, as if the cave opening had simply disappeared. Suddenly, they heard a buzzing and whirring sound, as if some large machine was being turned on. The buzzing and whirring got louder and louder. Soon, a light turned on.

"Where are we?!" Diana screamed. "I want to go home!"

The two girls were in a boat floating on some sort of underground river. All along the sides of the cave wall were creepy automatons singing a repetitive song about how "it's a small world" or something like that.

The two girls stared wide-eyed at the automatons, which all seemed to be staring back at them. Suddenly, one of the automatons, a creepy little blue-haired girl in a grey rebozo and wooden shoes, jumped out from its place, and landed in the girls' boat. It repeated a series of unintelligible babble, then jumped back off the boat. Both girls screeched in terror.

The boat stopped at what appeared to be a wooden dock- or, rather, a stage of sorts.

A voice said from nowhere in particular, "Ladies and gentlemen, give it up to the one and only Kiki the Singer!"

Floating down on a cardboard unicorn and landing on the stage was a pale, skinny man with blonde highlights in his wild, black hair and mustache, dressed in a rainbow-colored mohair suit.

"Good day, y'all," the man said with a slight lisp. "It's time for me to sing a song!"

"Mr. Phillips?!" both girls exclaimed in shock.


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks to AnneWithAnEStory and sol y luna 0428 for their wonderful comments! I hope all my lovely readers enjoy this next chapter, and I hope you-all even feel a little bit of suspense. ;)**

 **Trigger warning(s): Mentions of corporal punishment. A couple of the characters also lament dying.**

Following Angus through the woods was not particularly fun. He kept turning and walking in random directions, and he sang all fifteen verses of "Dulaman" before switching to a medley of "Come By the Hills" and "Thriller". Cole and Jerry were not pleased by his carefree attitude, which pestered them the darker the sky became. Soon, it was going to be night, and they'll have gotten nowhere.

"Monsieur Angus," Jerry said, "Cole and I would really like to get back to where we came from soon. Are we almost out of here?"

"I'm afraid you'll have to stay here overnight," Angus said. "Good thing my cabin is nearby."

"I know we're supposed to be nervous," Cole said, "but a cabin in the woods sounds quite picturesque. I'd love to draw something like that, but I don't draw anymore- I'm now a sculptor, not a boring pencil-manipulator."

They soon reached Angus's cabin, which was rather large for a cabin and appeared to be made out of candies and pastries.

"I don't like the look of this," Cole said. "On second thought, this isn't as picturesque as it is suspicious."

"Yeah, it's totally sus," Jerry said.

"Come on, boys," Angus said, smiling. "My wife must be inside right now making us a delicious supper."

Angus led them to the cabin, opened the door, and led them inside.

"Wow, this is real cozy-looking," Jerry said, gazing at the wood floor, wood ceiling, wood walls, wood table, wood davenport, &tc. "All it needs is a tapestry of someone licking a unicorn's nostril, and it's all set."

"That's disgusting," Cole said. "The tapestry should contain a unicorn licking its foal or colt's nostril- that way, it'd be more endearing and less squickish."

"My wife must be in the kitchen," Angus said. "Chérie, tous est prête, n'est-ce pas?"

"Un moment," a voice called from another room.

Angus and the boys sat down at a round wooden table on uncomfortable wooden chairs, waiting for the food to come out. After a minute or so, out of the kitchen came a woman carrying some sort of veggie casserole, dragging behind her a wagon full of goodies, cakes, and sweet breads.

Everyone said Grace and started eating, when Cole noticed something about Angus's wife. She had rather pointy features, and was a rather skinny. Her hair did not go with her face- in fact, it was platinum blonde, but the face itself by was neither pale nor tan. Also, the woman's lips looked extremely familiar- Cole remembered once staring at lips that looked like that.

"Madame," he said, "comment vous appelez-vous?"

"Je m'appelle Kiki," the woman said, running a hand through her hair absent-mindedly. "Mucho gusto de conocerlo."

"Angus," Cole said, "you do realize that your wife isn't who she says she is- in fact, she's not even a woman."

"What do you mean?" Angus asked.

"Your wife is none other," Cole said, "than Mr. Phillips!"

Cole reached out and pulled off that dreadful platinum blonde wig from Mr. Phillips head. Mr. Phillips looked so shocked at having been exposed, and for a moment his mouth hung almost as open as his eyes.

"Kiki, is this true?" Angus asked. "Comment peux-tu me mentir?!"

"Oh, Angus," Mr. Phillips said, "I only wanted to live in a world where there was such a thing as motor cars with air conditioning. So, please, forgive me, and we can change the fashion industry forever."

That statement was followed by stunned silence.

"That's definitely an original excuse," Angus said. "And an unexpected request."

"And now, I must be off," Mr. Phillips said dramatically. "I'm about to star in a radio production of 'As Time Goes By', where I'll be doing the voice of almost all the characters except Lionel and Davina."

"What's a radio?" Cole asked.

"Shut up, Cole!" Mr. Phillips said. He slammed the door as he left the cabin.

They all ate their food in silence. After they ate the dinner, Angus led the boys to the guest room. The guest room had a bamboo cage instead of a bed, which Angus pushed the boys into. He left the room, laughing wickedly.

"This is why one should never go into a house made of candy," Cole said.

"What do we do now?" Jerry asked pitifully.

"I don't know," Cole said.

"Speaking as someone who's been mugged and beat up before, this situation certainly isn't very ideal."

"At least it's a bamboo cage. We can saw our way out."

Anne and Diana were trudging along, wet from falling into the underground river, and cold from being out in the open at nighttime.

"I'm sure glad we escaped from that cave," Diana said.

"I was horribly mortified at the thought of us never getting out at all," Anne replied.

The two of them kept trudging along.

"Where are we going now?" Diana asked.

"I don't know," Anne moaned. "It's like these woods are a universe of their own!"

"Maybe they're some sort of woods between worlds," Diana said. "What if, to go from our universe to another universe, we can simply cross through this place. Maybe different puddles or ponds or underground rivers are the portals transport someone to those other universes."

"Wow, Diana," Anne said, tired but impressed. "You really are experiencing such an imaginative epiphany. You should write that idea down before someone less than a century from now writes their own best-selling book with that premise."

(Diana did eventually write the idea down, but with was one of her descendants who actually wrote the book itself; it's still a controversial topic whether or not Anne's admonition was useful).

The two girls finally reached the edge of the woods, but it wasn't the edge they wanted to get to. They appeared to be on a cliff above the ocean.

"Oh, isn't this the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?" Anne asked.

Before Diana could reply, Anne started to sing.

"徐徐回望 曾属于彼此的晚上  
红红仍是你 赠我的心中艳阳  
如流傻泪 祈望可体恤兼见谅  
明晨离别你 路也许孤单得漫长… (&tc.)"

Diana was heavily moved by how beautiful the song was. It was the perfect song to sing while gazing out at the sea, and brought to mind the days of old. Sort of. Personally, both girls secretly regarded the theme from "A Better Tomorrow" as their favorite beach song, but right now wasn't a time to pick favorite songs.

They started walking along the cliff, when they noticed a giant pterodactyl flying in their direction.

"Oh, look," Anne said. "It's a pelican with bat wings and a mouse tail."

"It's ugly, and really freaking me out," Diana said.

"Maybe it just wants to be friends with us, like my fox friend back in Avonlea."

The pterodactyl swooped down and tried to bite the girls, which came as quite a shock to them.

Just then, out of the woods jumped the wolf they had met earlier. She growled, snarled, spat, and hissed at the pterodactyl; soon, the two monstrous creatures were growling and arguing at each other. Eventually, the pterodactyl flew away.

"Merci pour nos aider," Diana said.

"Yes, thank you," Anne said. "I don't know what we would have done if you-"

The wolf bit Anne in the arm. Anne screamed in terror as the wolf gnawed viciously at her muscles and ligaments.

Diana grabbed at the wolf's jumper, trying to drag the wolf off Anne. The jumper tore, causing the wolf to glare at Diana.

"Um… Sorry?" Diana chuckled nervously.

The wolf decided it was now time to attack Diana.

"Diana, do the armadillo!" Anne shouted.

"What?!" Diana asked, shielding her face from the wolf.

"Crouch in fetal position!" Anne replied.

"Oh, that."

Diana did the armadillo, but the wolf kept gnawing at her back like some jerk.

Anne reached out, grabbed the rip in the wolf's jumper, and ripped it even more.

Soon, the wolf was glaring at Anne. Diana quickly climbed up a tree. She picked up a Roget's Pocket Thesaurus that she found in the branches, and dropped it, which startled the wolf, giving Anne a chance to climb up the tree.

Once both girls were safely up the tree, they noticed that pterodactyl flying back in their direction again. Before the pterodactyl reach their tree, though, the girls noticed that the tree was rocking back and forth unsteadily.

"Oh, look!" Anne said, picking up a bug that had been crawling on the trunk. "This appears to be some sort of termite."

Just then, the tree fell down, the top part where the girls were being just farther than the edge of the cliff. The girls clung onto the trunk the best they could, but the tree falling caused the colony of termites inside to panic. They all crawled over the girls' hands, causing the girls to let go due to how ticklish their index and ring fingers were. The two girls fell down into the ocean.

As the girls tried to make sense of all that'd just happened, they noticed a dark, looming shape headed towards them. It was a shark. This particular shark was Roswell's bark-loving cougar shark, which, unfortunately for Anne and Diana, especially loved prey that smelled like tree bark.

Diana screamed, which caused a lot of water to enter her mouth and lungs. Anne glared at the shark, and was willing to do anything to protect her bosom friend from that carnivorous meanie. She grabbed Diana, and started to swim upwards. The shark tried to bite at Anne's foot, but her toes tickled the shark's nose, causing it to sneeze, causing the a wave of water to send the girls upward towards the surface even more than before.

Once the girls were at the surface, they found that there was no land to be found. They were literally stuck in the middle of the ocean. Diana spit up some water, then started to cry at how awful their situation was.

"Anne, I'm scared that this might be the end," she said.

Just then, a sea turtle poked its head out of the water near the girls. It instantly went over to Diana, and used its wet flipper to dry her tearful face.

"Konbanwa, shojo-chan," the sea turtle said. "Gokigen ikaga?"

Diana kept crying.

"Sorry," Anne said, "I don't speak French, and she's too hysterical to understand your particular dialect. Do you speak English, by any chance?"

"Of course!" the sea turtle replied. "I went to all the best schools in Tokyo, even though I was originally a bear trapped by the Ainu."

"Cool," Anne said. "Could be ever so kind as to give us directions out of here?"

"Out of the ocean?" The turtle thought a moment. "I can take you to dry land tomorrow, but my home is closer. Would you mind staying there the night? It's about to get dark soon, and the sea lions come out at night to get drunk and get into fights."

The two girls didn't have much of a choice. The sea turtle took them all the way down to the bottom of the ocean to a magical land run by a powerful queen named Otohime.

The sea turtle brought them to a banquet table; Otohime was sitting regally on one end, gazing at the girls curiously.

"Otohime Sama," the sea turtle said, "anata rokudenashi desu."

"Arigatou," Otohime said. "Girls, may I ask your names?"

"I'm Anne Shirley-Cuthbert," Anne said, "and this is my bosom friend Diana Barry."

"Oh, how interesting…" Otohime chewed on the end of her golden fork. "What were you doing out in the middle of the ocean when my sea turtle friend found you?"

"We had just finished being engaged in an absolutely mortifying battle with a shark," Anne explained.

"We almost died!" Diana hollered, still in shock from the events of that day.

"How interesting," Otohime repeated herself. "Come, sit around the table with me. I've prepared only my most delectable fish friends- er, subjects, slaves- for our dinner tonight."

The girls sat down, but they couldn't bring themselves to eat any of the fish. It just felt really long, especially after hearing Otohime's comment. They were hungry, though, so after being excused from the table and escorted to their guest quarters, they asked the sea turtle if she could fetch them some jam and rye bread. The bread tasted a little fishy, but the girls didn't notice till after eating it.

They went to sleep, not remembering later whether or not they'd had any dreams.

Gilbert was sitting in the corner, writing his emo poetry.

"Oh, Anne,  
If only I could face you honestly  
And tell you honestly  
About my gut-wrenching love for you-

Then I'd be able to look myself  
In the mirror  
Without  
Feeling that overwhelming sense of hate.

But is my hatred pointed towards myself  
or  
Towards you?"

"Seriously?" Aunt Josephine said, looking over Gilbert's shoulder.

"I have reason to hate her," Gilbert said. "She beat me in the spelling bee."

"I thought you let her beat you."

"Yeah." Gilbert smiled, and, placing a hand under his chin, thought dreamily about that moment. It was so cute how Anne reacted to everything! It just made him want to go out and buy himself a bucket-full of turnips and eat them one by one while thinking about Anne's red hair.

"I wonder when Monsieur Beurre is getting back," Aunt Josephine said.

"Why can't we just go back into the woods without him?" Gilbert asked.

"Because that would be foolhardy," Aunt Josephine replied. "What sort of idiot goes into a deathtrap like that without the help of a local? Except me, of course."

"You've gone out into deathtraps alone?"

"No, there was always Gertrude to talk me into doing weird things like that. When we were living in India, she talked me into going into the jungle. We met a nice boy named Mowgli, who taught us how to do parkour. It was lit."

Gilbert was starting to feel concerned around Aunt Josephine. This woman obviously was oblivious to the facts, and did not know what she was doing.

"I'm not oblivious to anything vital at the moment," Aunt Josephine said, "despite not being sure how to find exactly where our friends are."

Gilbert frowned. He hadn't realized Aunt Josephine was a mind-reader.

"If only Bash were here…" Gilbert mumbled.

"What do you need me for?" Bash appeared out of nowhere.

Gilbert screamed, and Aunt Josephine laughed.

"Hello, Sebastian," Aunt Josephine said. "Anne has told me so much about you."

"Please to meet you, Missus…?" Bash waited for a reply.

"Bash, this is Aunt Josephine Barry," Gilbert said. "She's Diana's grand-aunt."

"Which one is Diana?" Bash asked.

"The Barries oldest daughter."

"Oh, the girl with the really racist parents. Hm. Anyways, Gilbert, I was just headed this way because I found your diary and have a few questions."

"Wait, did you read my diary, or was it just lying around."

"I read it. My, you're a madman indeed! Sorry about your sister."

"I forgot I wrote that in there."

"Anyways, you wrote that you wanted to give Anne a magic thimble, so I bought a whole set on the way over here."

He grabbed out of his pocket a small bag filled with two thimbles, one which was thimble-sized, and the other which was big enough to wear on one's head.

"I don't think Anne would like that humongous one," Gilbert said.

"I want it!" Aunt Josephine hollered, taking the thimble and putting it on her head. "It's just like the fez I wore when Gertrude and I were visiting Egypt. The pyramids were lovely, but Gertrude broke her leg trying to climb down into the sarcophagus chamber."

"Is this the only reason you came here?" Gilbert asked Bash. "If so, we really could use your help. Anne and all the unimportant people are lost in the woods."

"Honey child, I don't know how to navigate," Bash said, laughing. "Remember? I spent all my time down below deck, doing hard, arduous, low-paying, boring labor."

Gilbert frowned, then said, "Do you know of a man named Angus Snotty McRottery?"

Bash's eyes went wide open.

"Angus Botty McPottery?!" he exclaimed. "That man is none other than my arch-enemy!"

"Well, my friends might have fallen into his hands…" Gilbert started to say.

"Just Cole and Jerry," Aunt Josephine said.

"Forget about Angus and his evil-doings," Gilbert said to Bash. "We need to find Anne- I mean, the girls- first."

"Okay!" Bash said, smiling because Gilbert was mostly just thinking of Anne.

It took a while, but Jerry and Cole were able to saw their way out of the bamboo cage with their nail files. They snuck out of the room, and saw that Angus was too busy crying over a book he was reading and a box of chocolate to notice them.

The boys snuck out of the cabin, and then ran.

"Where are we going?" Jerry panted.

"I don't know," Cole replied.

They stopped running.

Cole looked at Jerry, and said, "Whatever is Mr. Phillips doing here?"

"What do you mean?"

"He's a bad man. He can't be here simply on vacation. I'm certain he's followed Anne and Diana, as well, and maybe even Gilbert and Aunt Josephine."

"You're exaggerating. He's obviously been here a while to be… Angus's wife, I guess? Why do you hate that guy so much, anyways? Wasn't it just that Billy kid who bullied you?"

"So did Mr. Phillips."

"Oh."

They decided to continue walking, get as far away from Angus's house as possible. They eventually came up to a cliff that overlooked the ocean.

"We must have walked incredibly far," Jerry said.

Just then, a pterodactyl flew by, cawing and squawking at them. The pterodactyl grabbed one boy in each of her clawed feet, and proceeded to carry them to her nest where her hungry babies waited. Of course, we all know pterosaurs and other flying creatures have a hard time carrying humans, which are incredibly heavy bipeds prone to causing flying predators to easily lose their balance. Before they knew it, the boys were dropped into the ocean.

"Thank you," Anne said to the sea turtle. She and Diana were standing on the beach, and bowed graciously to the turtle, who nodded her head back at them. "We are ever so grateful for your assistance. Thank Otohime Sama for hosting us, please."

"Of course," the sea turtle said. "Be sure to visit us again sometime soon. We don't get many visitors, except maybe a shark or two, and those types of guests typically push a loan on us. It felt good having polite guests for once."

The sea turtle left. The two girls stared at their surroundings.

"We're not in Quebec anymore," Diana said.

"What do you mean?" Anne asked.

"Look." The brunette pointed at the cliffs ahead of them.

Standing up on the cliff were Matthew and Marilla, gazing down at the two girls.

"Wait a second," Anne said, looking around. "We're back in Avonlea!"

"I guess the turtle did say she was taking us 'back home' instead of simply 'back'," Diana muttered.

The girls started walking the path that led up the cliff, wondering what was happening to their friends back in Grenouille.

Jerry and Cole were sitting at the bottom of the ocean, eating saltines. They were bored, waiting their death by drowning or shark attack. It was boring.

"I don't think I can die here," Cole said.

"We don't have much of a choice," Jerry said. "Neither of us knows how to swim, and we're stuck in a place even darker than the stomach of the fish which swallowed Jonah."

"My mother…" Cole started to say.

"My mother will be sad to learn I died, as well."

"But the last thing exchanged between my mother wasn't… amicable. She scolded me, beat me, then told me to go out and work outside till I drop."

"Well, that's okay. It's not like you'll be apart forever after death. You can both make up after you're both in Heaven."

"That's not a very comforting thought while I'm still on Earth."

Jerry reached into the dark and grabbed Cole's hand.

"Then take comfort anyways," the gentle farmhand said.

They sat where they were in silence.

"Hmmmm…" Monsieur Beurre said, staring at a map and picking his nose. "It looks like the kiddos would have found their way out of the woods by now…"

"That's what I thought," Aunt Josephine said.

"…Unless they're dead."

"That's what I was worried about."

The two older people stared at the map. If Anne, Diana, and Cole were there, they would have commented that they'd never before seen Aunt Josephine look quite so worried.

Bash said, "You could always send out a search party."

"No, we can't, dummy," Monsieur Beurre said, looking up from the map. "That would create a scandal, and this village can't afford another one."

"How is children getting lost in the woods a scandal?" Bash asked.

Monsieur Beurre rolled his eyes, then went back to looking at the map.

Gilbert walked out the front door, and started walking in the direction of the woods. He stopped right at the woods' entrance and stared at all the creepy trees, which looked much more foreboding now that it was dark.

"What are you doing?"

Gilbert jumped, and saw that Bash was right behind him.

Bash laughed.

"Aren't you the jumpiest boy on two legs?"

"That's not funny," Gilbert said. "I'm seriously worried about Anne, and, so far, no one's done anything about it."

"Why are you so worried about Anne, but can't seem to think of everyone else?"

"Because… because I'm in love with Anne!"

Suddenly, Anne walked out from behind a tree, and walked right up to Gilbert.

"Is it true?!" she asked, smiling.

Gilbert stared at Anne, wide-eyed with shock.

"Anne!" he said. "You're alive?!"

He hugged her and twirled her around in circles.

After Gilbert let go of her, Anne said, "I'm terrible sorry to have worried everyone. It was absolutely terrifying for Diana and me, being separated from the rest of the group. By morning, though, I was safe and sound back in Avonlea."

"Wait, what?"

"Well, the real me was."

The individual pretending to be Anne reached out and, touching Gilbert's head and shoulder, broke his neck. The skinny boy fell to the ground, dead.

"So Phil," fake Anne said, taking off that red wig, "you ready to really wreak havoc?"

"Oh, Aaron, you really read my mind," the fake Bash said, running a finger through his wild black hair and rubbing off his Kardashian-style spray-on tan.

The girls reached the top of the cliff. Anne hugged Marilla and Matthew, who seemed surprised, even shocked.

"Oh, Marilla, Matthew!" Anne said. "It feels so good to be safe, back in Avonlea!"

"Who are you, child?" Marilla asked, pushing Anne away.

Anne laughed, saying, "I'm Anne! Sorry I'm back so late, it's just that…"

Marilla gazed at Anne sternly, and Matthew stared at the ground sheepishly.

"Anne," Diana said, "I don't think they remember you."

"But, you two adopted me," Anne said to her parents, who were treating her like a stranger.

"I would never adopt anyone," Marilla said. "especially not an unreserved, annoying redhead like yourself!"

Anne felt about ready to cry. She was dumbfounded, her tongue for once unable to express the confusion, anger, and fear she was now feeling.

Anne watched Matthew and Marilla walk away, saddened that they hadn't recognized her.

Once Anne's adopted parents were out of sight, Diana said, "I think I finally figured out what has happened."

Anne looked at Diana questioningly.

Diana continued, "We are in an alternate reality."


	3. Chapter 3

**This is the final chapter of "The Penal Coroner". I hope everyone's enjoyed it. Be sure to leave a review, or comment, or even a suggestion for a possible sequel. :)**

 **Trigger warnings: Drug dealing and drug use.**

"What do we do now?" Anne asked.

She and Diana had been walking around Avonlea, trying to see if there were enough differences between this Avonlea and their own to warrant it the label "alternate reality". Sure enough, the road was made of some sort of reddish dirt, the houses were unpainted and made of some sort of dark pinewood, and there was a fountain in the middle of town. To make matters weirder, some of the village folk started talking to them.

The first person they bumped into in this reality, besides Matthew and Marilla, was none other than that d*uchebag Billy Andrews.

"Hey, Diana," Billy said, rushing up to her from down the street. "I was just going to the store, and your mother said you were out of salt, margarine, and thread. Could you help me choose the right type of thread?"

"Why would my mother want that?" Diana asked. "To perform an Irish spell?"

Billy laughed gleefully.

"Oh, Diana!" he said. "You always had the wildest imagination! Now, who's your friend?"

Billy held out his hand to Anne.

"The name's Billy Andorsky," he said. He shyly added, "You have really lovely titian hair, might I say."

Anne simply stared at the blond boy, not sure what to say.

"Billy," Diana said, "could you please tell us where we are?"

"Why, you're in Avonlea, silly!"

"And who is the richest family in Avonlea?"

"That would be the Baynards. Do you really not remember? They bought your family's land after your father's bankruptcy from wasting so many pennies on those swindling crooks."

"Nate and Mr. Dunlop?"

Anne tensed up thinking of her almost kindred spirit, Mr. Dunlop.

"No, my father and mother."

After much talking, Diana and Anne figured out that Mr. and Mrs. Andorsky had tried to sell "pure gold" toilet paper to the town. It was only fifteen carats. Mr. Barry had gone bankrupt after that, so he murdered the Andorsky couple with a Play-Do knife. Several families adopted one Andorsky kid each- Billy just so happened to be living with the Pyes, and Josie had been eyeing him so much at the dinner table that the clueless boy accidentally scheduled her an eye doctor appointment.

Also, apparently Billy had an intense crush on Diana, so the now-rich Jerry had challenged him to a duel, which Diana stopped by offering to court both of them. Eventually, Diana got engaged to them, and was soon to be Diana Barry-Andorsky-Baynard the Third.

"This is terribly overwhelming," Diana said, sitting right on the ground.

After the girls left Billy (who was picking petals off of a daisy), they bumped into their good friend Ruby. She was hiding in an alleyway, smiling slyly.

"Hello, Diana," Ruby said. "Hello, strange-girl-whom-I-don't-know. Would you two like to buy some of my super expensive, mysterious, white powder? It'll make you really happy!"

"Uh, no thanks," Anne said, remembering Mr. Cracker, the crack and cracker vendor who would sell his goods just outside the orphanage where she used to live.

"Anne, we must be nice to our good friend Ruby," Diana said, "even if she is acting a little weird."

"Oh, I'm weird, alright," Ruby said. "That's why I'm wearing _these_ stockings."

She lifted up her dress skirt a little, revealing a pair of long, rainbow-colored, black-light toe-socks.

"I think Mr. Phillips has ben through this place," Anne said, shocked by how bright the socks were.

"Oh, you mean Phil?" Ruby asked. "He's totally a pleb. He doesn't even know who Barbara Streisand is!"

"Who's Barbara Streisand?" Diana and Anne both asked.

Ruby glared at them indignantly, then went and hid in the shadow of a trash heap.

Anne and Diana walked around for a while, until they found themselves out-of-town and headed in direction of the Blythe-LaCroix house.

"Do you want to dare see what Gilbert's like in this reality?" Diana asked.

"I have to," Anne said resolutely. "If anyone here is sensible, it's him."

"Shouldn't you say 'it's he'?"

"I don't know. And I don't care- it's not like I'll be a teacher anytime soon."

They walked up to the house, and rang the doorbell. The door fell flat onto the veranda instantly, almost flattening the two girls. They heard a voice say from the inside, "Come in," and, not knowing what else to do, went in.

They found Gilbert lounging on a Barney-colored lounge chair, wearing blue duckling-print pajamas and a head-bandage, and smoking a joint.

"Hey-ya, cakesniffers," Gilbert said. "Whatchall doin' here?"

"Gilbert, what are you doing?!" Anne exclaimed, rushing over to her friend/rival and pulling the joint out of his mouth. She dropped it on the floor and stamped on it. "This stuff can kill you, you know that, right?"

"Everyone's doing it these days," Gilbert said lazily. "You're that girl from the school, right?"

"Yes, I'm Anne Shirley-Cuthbert. We've been classmates for over two years…"

"No, you're not whoever you're talking about. You're the girl who's been teaching us about electricity and the dangers of electric chainsaws."

"You mean Miss Stacey?"

"Yeah, that's the one."

"I'm not Miss Stacey, I'm Anne."

"No, Anne's the really pretty girl with the black hair who can say something in French besides 'Parlez-vous franglais'."

"You're talking about Diana, right?"

"Yeah, her. Where is she? Can I meet her."

"I'm right here," Diana said.

"Cool," Gilbert said, smiling and then pulling out his teeth one-by-one.

The girls felt like they were getting nowhere.

Jerry and Cole had dozed off when suddenly what appeared to be a door floated down in the depths of the sea towards them. Jerry noticed it because the door was partly open, letting out an incredibly bright light.

"Cole, wake up!" Jerry said, shaking Cole.

"But I want to buy the bubblegum, not the death machine…" Cole muttered, obviously dreaming about something slightly weird.

"Cole, on doit reveiller!"

"What, Jerry?"

"Il y a une porte ici!"

"Quelle port? Oh, cette porte. Wow, cette lumière est trop brillante!"

Both boys stared at the door's light for a while.

"Let's go in!" Jerry said adventurously.

"What's the worst that could happen?" Cole added, shrugging his shoulders.

They walked towards the door, which tried to run away from them. Thankfully, there are, like, a million forgotten pool noodles at the bottom of the ocean. Cole used one to whack the door, causing it to calm down a little. Both boys entered through it.

They found themselves in the middle of a large group of young men in hideous green uniforms. The uniforms contained red armbands each with an askew black swastika.

"Why's the swastika askew?" Jerry asked. "These imbeciles can't even get a well-known symbol right."

"Oh, so you are English," one of the taller young men said. "So you must know, English men, that we are at war."

"Actually, we're Canadian," Cole said, chuckling. "We're technically apart of the Commonwealth, but most of the crap we do escapes the Crown's radar."

"Well, whatever you are, prepare to face the wrath of the Führer!" the young man hollered at the top of his lungs. "We will take you to him now!"

Just then, Jerry and Cole noticed that the moving door had disappeared, and that they were being grabbed by the arms and dragged down a long, creepy, white hallway.

Eventually, they reached an office at the end of the hallway. In the office, behind a desk sat a Charlie Chaplin cosplayer.

"Your Highness, Führer, sir!" the young man hollered. "These two English men appeared through a magic portal, and are wanting to assassinate all of us!"

"How could this be?" the Charlie Chaplin cosplayer yelled angrily. "How dare anything think they can kill my soldiers!"

"I think we're gonna die," Jerry said to Cole.

"I think so, too," Cole replied.

"Do you think they'll be kind enough not to torture us?"

"I wouldn't count on it. People who cosplay in their normal lives tend to do weird things simply because they're 'in character'."

Before they knew it, the boys were being dragged into a kitchen and forced to scrub the floor with Napalm. They then had to lick the chemicals and mildew out from beneath the sink. They then had to swallow large ice cubes.

"And now," the chef, Herr Fleischer, said, "we will cut off your digits one-by-one!"

Both boys tried to run away, but Herr Fleischer and his sidekick Herrlein Freundlich caught them and cut their hair with a used sheep tail-docking instrument. Both boys now had hideous haircuts, but it's the thought that counts.

They were eventually thrown into a cage- a metal one, this time.

"What do we do now?" Jerry asked. "Our nail files will never get through these bars!"

"We will have to use our wits," Cole said.

"That's possible?"

"Of course, that's… Seriously? Why would we not be able to use our wits? What do you think we've been using this whole time?"

"I'm not sure, but I still don't feel like our wits would have allowed us to get into such unfortunate situations. I mean, if we were truly smart, we'd…"

Just then, a freemartin walked up to the cage, and started licking the tops of the boys' heads.

"Ew, this is so disgusting!" Cole said.

"You grew up on a farm, get over it," Jerry said.

"It was all plant agriculture," Cole said. "My mother is a woke vegan."

Aunt Josephine was wondering where Gilbert, Bash, and Monsieur Beurre had disappeared to. She'd been looking at the maps when she realized they were all gone. She eventually figured out to follow them to the woods, and she witnessed Monsieur Beurre killing poor Gilbert. It thoroughly disturbed her.

Something had to be done, and it involved revenge.

Monsieur Beurre's reputation did not last long after Aunt Josephine told everyone in Grenouille about him murdering an innocent child.

Revenge can be sweet.

Anyways, after getting Monsieur Beurre safely behind (bamboo) bars, Aunt Josephine called the local apothecary to revive Gilbert, who was still lying dead just outside the woods. The apothecary, a curly-haired woman in a Renaissance style dress named Mère Gothel, put her fingers on Gilbert's throat.

"Il encore a un pouls," she said. "Je pense que j'peux lui réanimer. Sorry… ranimer."

"Where are you from?" Aunt Josephine asked, observing Mère Gothel's strange demeanor.

"Chuis de Montréal, d'accord," the apothecary said.

"Yeah, whatever. Just make sure this kid lives- I could never forgive myself if he stayed dead. This is all my fault for trusting old Aaron."

Mère Gothel got out a weird contraption from her red apothecary purse. The contraption looked like a vaccine noodle, though it was large enough to plaster tiles. It was covered in an odd assortment of poached feathers, and when Gothel took it out of the purse, it made the area around them smell like cocoa-scented Vaseline.

The apothecary pushed the tip of the contraption up Gilbert's nose, and pushed the inject-y button at the other end. Suddenly, Gilbert's eyes opened wide. Then, they closed again.

"Après de quinze minutes on saura si ce gosse vivra," Mère Gothel said.

"Seriously?" Aunt Josephine said. "You used the word 'gosse'? Also, fifteen minutes seems like a long time."

"Halt die Klappe!" Mère Gothel said, forgetting for a second to speak French. "Um… er… Je suis désolée, Madame."

The apothecary left Aunt Josephine, who could do nothing but wait for Gilbert to wake up.

Gilbert felt his spirit leave his body. In his spirit, he climbed a stairway, headed towards a bright light. Once he reached the top of the stairway to Heaven, he was greeted by a man whom he knew so well.

"Dad!" he exclaimed, hugging his father.

"Gilbert, look how much you've grown!" Mr. Blythe said. "Has it really been only a year?"

"It has," Gilbert said. "But so much has happened- it feels like a whole lifetime of its own. I met some wonderful people, saw so many wonderful places."

"I am so glad you're not living alone," Mr. Blythe said. "Please thank Sebastian and Mary for me- that is, if you decide to go back."

"Go back?" Gilbert asked. "I thought I was dead."

"An apothecary is trying to revive you," Mr. Blythe said. "It looks like God is letting you have options."

Gilbert thought a moment, thinking about how wonderful it would be to enter Heaven, to have every tear wiped from his eyes, but also about how he still had responsibilities and loved ones back on Earth.

"What's wrong, Gilbert?"

"I don't know what to do."

"Then go back to Earth."

"But…"

"That girl Anne isn't ready for you to die yet. Neither is your new family. Go back."

Gilbert immediately rushed down the stairs, scared that his body would die completely before he had a chance to be reunited with Anne.

Mr. Blythe smiled as his son descended the stairs. He noticed Jesus next to him.

"He didn't ask me what I wanted him to do," Jesus said. "Didn't even listen for my voice. Oh, well. He'll have the rest of his life to learn how to do that."

"Will he learn to discern your will in quite that way?" Mr. Blythe asked. "I mean, it's not like anyone in Avonlea is a Pentecostal."

"But they're Presbyterians, Methodist, and Catholics, which are all a step above Baptists."

"Touché."

"Seriously, Gilbert!" Anne hollered. "Can you at least give us any sage advice on how to get out of this reality and go to our own?"

"Go back the way you came," Gilbert said, shrugging his shoulders, sitting in a whicker rocking chair with rockets tied precariously on it. "I mean, you came by ocean, right? Go back in there."

"But we almost drowned, and had to be saved by a super conveniently-timed sea turtle," Anne said.

"Frankly, Miss Carrots, I don't give a damn," Gilbert said, chewing on his long, manicured fingernails. "Can you leave now?"

Anne and Diana left the house, walked to the beach, and walked into the ocean. This truly was the only option.

The sea turtle was waiting for them.

"I think I dropped you two off at the wrong place," she said. "Sorry. We should totally leave now."

Jerry and Cole somehow convinced the freemartin to use her horns to unlock the door of the cage. They got on the freemartin's back, and she smashed through several walls, taking them outside. She then sprouted wings, and they flew off into the distance.

"Look at how small all the people look from up here!" Cole said, his hands clutching the freemartin's horns. "The world would be so fun to draw from this perspective- I mean, think about how lovely it is up here."

"Everything seems so much smaller," Jerry agreed. "Maybe, in the grand scheme of the universe, Earth isn't as big and intimidating as we think it is."

The freemartin flew over valleys, hills, and forests. Eventually, they reached the ocean.

"Please take us back to where we belong," Cole said.

The freemartin mooed happily.

Jerry, who already had his arms loosely around Cole's waist, held on tighter. Everything felt so spectacular up in the sky, and the young farmhand was glad he got to spend this time with the artist.

"Jerry," Cole said, startling Jerry out of his thoughts. "Um… When we get back, do you think things will be normal again?"

"I don't believe in normal," Jerry said. "God would not be so unkind to us."

The children were on the train, headed safely back to Charlottetown. Aunt Josephine kept glancing at them awkwardly, feeling guilty for having put them in harm's way.

"Aunt Josephine," Diana said, breaking the awkward silence, "you didn't know that Monsieur Beurre was evil. It's not your fault he simply wanted to invite kids over to cause them anguish and emotional torment."

"I should have known, though," Aunt Josephine said.

"My question is," Anne said, "how did he do it? Did he plan everything we came up against, or did he simply know that the woods were a world of their own?"

"And did he know that the ocean outside the woods was an oversized portal to alternate realities and time periods?" Cole asked.

"I think he did," Jerry said. "But he needed help from a professor, like Mr. Phillips, to figure out time-and-space-dimensions travel!"

"You realize that Mr. Phillips studied to be an educator, not a mad scientist?" Gilbert asked.

"How would I know?" Jerry sniffed, eyeing Gilbert quizzically and suspiciously. "I never went to school. That being said, the villains seemed to take an especial interest in you- they wouldn't dare actually harm any of us directly, except for you. What are you hiding from us, Gilbert?"

"Nothing!" Gilbert held up his hands defensively. "I'm just as much a victim as the rest of you."

"Jerry's right," Anne said. "Maybe Gilbert was just too smart, and Monsieur Beurre and Mr. Phillips knew he would figure them out too soon."

"Well, I am rather smart," Gilbert said, smiling.

Once in Charlottetown, the children had a thirty-minute layover before going back to Avonlea. That's when Gilbert asked Anne _the_ question.

"Anne…" he said, nervously.

"Yes, Gilbert?"

Their friends were staring at them expectantly.

"Anne, I, um… I want to ask you something. Will you… oy…"

"Gilbert, do you want to go out sometime?"

Gilbert just stared at Anne, stunned.

"Y-yes," he said.

"Good," Anne said. "Let's talk about it some more later, like tomorrow, after our friends have settled down."

Their friends, and everyone else on that train platform, were all smiling from ear-to-ear. The air felt stifling, it was so full of happiness. Anne and Gilbert were now Facebook-officially "Shirbert". Can you think of many more things that make you feel so giddy and gleeful, in quite that way? It's not rapture, but it sure makes a fellow want to celebrate!

(By the way, the sheep were still having their convention by the next morning. This statement has two meanings: The Annual Prince Edward Island Sheep Convention was still going on, and the children all slept in late due to exhaustion from their dangerous adventure.)

The End.


End file.
